


Everything Happens, All at Once

by pinkpop



Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Alcohol, Angry Kissing, Enemies to Lovers, Jack being Jack, Other, Sexual Tension, flirting that could be considered lowkey sexual harassment, pushy jack
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:48:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24670315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pinkpop/pseuds/pinkpop
Summary: Handsome Jack has cordially invited you to come with him to a fancy do at some rich guy's mansion. In exchange for having a night of fun with such a handsome hero, he'll let you go home to your family back in Sanctuary, rather than back to your holding cell in the city of Opportunity. The only catch is that he'll be rather tipsy. And he also really wants to bone you.There will be drinks and cake and maybe a little bit of smooching. RSVP!
Relationships: Handsome Jack (Borderlands)/Reader
Comments: 7
Kudos: 46





	Everything Happens, All at Once

**3:32 am**

“That was…” Jack sighs, laying back against the pillows, sprawled out on the huge four-poster bed as though he owns it. “Great,” he drawls.  
You swing your legs over the side of the mattress, gather up your clothes from the floor with the sheets covering what little modesty you have left. “That should never have happened,” you say, curt.  
“Oh, come on,” he sighs, rolling his eyes. “Don’t be such a downer.”  
You tuck your messy hair behind your ear and slip into the bathroom to get changed.

**5 hours earlier**

The room is alive with people, all in their finest silk gowns and Victorian-looking top hats. You’re doing your best not to suffocate among the sea of unbearably rich people that flood the place, but each time you think the room has reached capacity, another wave of them pours in through the grand doors; men in their perfectly tailored suits with bored-looking women at their arms.  
It’s at around the 5th or 6th cocktail that you begin to regret accepting Jack’s deal.  
_“One night with you at the masquerade bash and maybe I’ll let you go home to your horrible little gutter city,”_ he’d said. He’d smiled so wide when the words had slithered from his tongue that you could have almost forgotten that he was holding you captive.  
It seemed like a good enough deal. One night of dealing with the ravenous dictator’s less-than-subtle advances and you’d be free to return home to Sanctuary. You were certain it’d be simple enough. Assured yourself you’d be able to grit your teeth and bear it.  
What Jack had neglected to mention in his sales pitch, however, was the fact that he’d be getting on the wrong side of tipsy whilst you were both here. And do you know what happens when Handsome Jack gets tipsy, boys and girls?  
Everything.  
Everything happens all at once.  
Jack comes sauntering across the ballroom floor with a neon blue cocktail in one hand and you _would_ clench your teeth in preparation if you weren’t so relieved by the idea of him whisking you away from the absolutely insufferable group of old billionaires you’d been surrounded by.  
He’s just tipped a full tray of champagne glasses upside down because… well, because he _can,_ you suppose. Nobody here would try to stop him. The crash had dulled the conversations a little, but his behaviour clearly wasn’t surprising enough to these people anymore to stop them from talking entirely. Either they’re used to his antics by now or they just love the sound of their own voices as much as he does.  
The men around you cease their dull and painfully fake small talk to turn their attention on Jack, who stops at the edge of the circle and covertly pulls you a step back from them, putting himself between them and you. You’d slap him for manhandling you if you A: weren’t afraid of him shooting your family, and B: weren’t grateful for the extra step of distance between you and Mr Wellard, with his twitching moustache and smoker’s cough.  
“You aren’t trying to seduce my date, right, Mr Wellard?” Jack asks the heavier-set man, grinning. He gestures at him with his neon blue glass. “Because I _will_ have you shot to death.”  
You glance around over his shoulder at the mess of smashed glasses he’s left in his wake, the two waiters on their hands and knees, picking up the pieces. Ever since the Vault Hunter killed Jack’s girlfriend, he’d be even more testy than usual, according to the Hyperion guards you’d heard talking outside your cell the other night. The way they tell it, Jack is likely to kill at least 30% of this crowd by the end of the evening. Still, the death of his lover clearly hasn’t stopped Jack from living it large. There are people back in Sanctuary that haven’t eaten in days and here, the table is stacked with lavish mountains of food that will surely be left to go stale.  
“We were just talking about the importance of -” Mr Wellard speaks.  
“Boring,” Jack shouts, “let’s go do something fun.” He pulls you by the wrist and the urge to smack him all the way to Elpis reemerges.  
“These people are awful,” you murmur.  
“Of course they are, cupcake,” he smiles. “They’re rich.”  
Jack sways on his feet a little as he stops at the bar. He asks you what you want to drink, but after shaking your head in response, he goes ahead and orders you the most expensive thing on the menu; a fizzing pink mixture with gold glitter floating in it and gold flakes around the rim of the glass. It looks like it’ll go straight to your head with dizzying consequences, but you can’t deny that it looks appetising.  
You take a few careful sips, eyes surveying the room over the rim of the glass as you do. Jack watches you, paying no mind to the people looking at him from the other side of the bar. He must be used to the stares by now. You try your best not to make eye contact with him. The last thing you want is for him to think you’re enjoying yourself here. But it turns out that it’s really hard to ignore someone who’s staring at you like you’re the most mouth-watering thing on the buffet table.  
You swallow a mouthful of the sweet pink drink and look up at him. “Why are you looking at me?” you ask, trying not to let your voice shake. This is a man who smashes things for fun, after all.  
“I’m wondering,” he says.  
“Wondering what?” You hold the glass with both hands, clutching it close to your chest.  
“If you’re a _sex on the first date_ kinda -” you roll your eyes at him and move away from the bar “- oh, come on, I’m just curious,” he says, catching up with you. “So sue me.”  
You turn and face him and he pulls up short behind you, smile as wide as the Tundra and about as glittery as any one of his gaudy statues back in Opportunity. You stand up as straight as possible, trying to match his height as close as you can. He still has a few inches on you, despite your efforts.  
“I’m not here for your benefit,” you tell him. “I’m here because you offered me a deal and I was gracious enough to do you the honour of taking it. Now, I will happily turn for the door and hop, skip and jump my pretty little ass out of this shithole and resign myself to my cell with no problem. So unless you want to spend the rest of your night alone and drunk in the middle of this dance floor while these people laugh at you behind your back then I suggest you shut up.”  
Jack looks at you with a frown and something that feels horribly similar to regret roils in your gut. But as his lips slowly curl into a smirk, you find it quickly replaced by anger and frustration. He nods his head, impressed.  
“Yes!” he cheers. The immediate crowd around you turn their heads slightly to look at you both, wondering, no doubt, what Jack is shouting about this time. “That’s the kind of anger I like to see,” he says, reining the volume of his voice in a little. “You know, you’re _real_ hot when you’re pissed off. I could really see myself liking you that way. Maybe if we got rid of those bandit clothes you wear. A little makeup here and there, too.”  
Your nostrils flare, despite how hard you’re trying to keep it together. If he wasn’t so weirdly charming about it, then it wouldn’t be so difficult to remain calm. But those mismatched eyes are just dreamy enough to make you feel some type of way.  
“Relax,” Jack says, throwing his arm around your shoulder. “I’m just trying to get under your skin. Have a drink, loosen up a little.”

**3:35 am**

“You need to loosen up a little,” Jack says as you reemerge from the bathroom with your clothes back on. “You wouldn’t be the first person to find me utterly irresistible.”  
“I don’t find you anything but repulsive,” you tell him. Although you’re not sure you can sell that lie very well after what you just did together.  
“Oh, yeah,” Jack scoffs, “and I’m the King of Promethea.” There’s a moment of quiet while you lace up your shoes. “Actually,” Jack says. “I think I am. I'm sure I remember being coronated on my birthday last year.”

**3 hours earlier**

“You can have extra toppings if you want,” Jack says, mouth full of cake. He spoons extra helpings of chocolate frosting and caramel chunks onto your plate liberally. “You can have anything you want,” he says, finishing off his slice and wiping his hands on the back of some poor unsuspecting man’s suit. “This is my party and you’re my plus one. Anything goes.”  
You look down at the heaps of cake and chocolate on your plate. It’s heaped higher than you could ever stomach in one sitting, even if you weren’t already slightly nauseated by the sweetness of your pink drink from earlier.  
“You really live your whole life like this?” you ask Jack as the pair of you take a seat at a circular table in the corner of the room.  
“Hell yeah, baby,” he says. “Money, women, and enough cake to kill a room full of diabetics.”  
“Don’t you find it… empty? Like… don’t you want more?”  
Jack leans back in his chair and rests his foot up on his knee. You can see him thinking his answer over in the brief moment it takes him to loosen his tie. He’s clearly reached the point of the evening that most men reach, where he can’t stand being in his suit anymore and wants nothing more than to be naked.  
It’s at that point that a very dangerous thought enters your head and you shove it down with all your might, looking away as he unbuttons the top few buttons of his dress shirt.  
“I always want more,” he says. Strangely, there’s no joke in the way that he says it. No confidence, no jovial schoolboy attempt at humour. He’s simply stating a fact and you find yourself wondering if he likes that part of him. The part that never finds anything good enough. It must be a tiring way to live; to always strive for new things and always be disappointed once you have them.  
“I’ll let you into a little secret though,” he says, flagging down a champagne server and plucking three glasses from the tray (one for you and two for him, of course).  
You push cake around your plate, taking small forkfuls every now and then. “Go on then.”  
“I never used to be like this,” he says.  
“You mean rich?”  
He shakes his head and knocks back a gulp of champagne. You can’t help but think he’s self-medicating with the amount of booze he’s chugged since arriving. “No,” he says. “I mean, you’re right; I wasn’t always rich. But that’s not what I meant.” He sets his champagne on the table between you and circles the rim of his glass with his fingertip, staring down into the pale fizzy drink as though he’s lost in thought.  
“I used to be… fulfilled,” he says, a weak smile on his lips. “I had a wife. She was cool. Died. Wasn’t anyone’s fault. Just… happened.”  
You look at him and swallow. “You were…”  
“I was,” he nods. “I was different then. There was none of this, “ he waves to the extravagance of the party around you, “and we had no money. I was pretty quiet, y’know? Didn’t have much to yell about.”  
The moment is quiet, rather poignant. “Sounds like you were…”  
Jack clears his throat and sits up. “Boring,” he says. “I was boring.”  
And just like that, the moment is swallowed alive. _Poof._  
“I mean, look at me now, right? I’m eating cake with a hot piece of ass in a damn ballroom with a floor made of gold and I’m well on the way to getting lucky tonight, so I’d say I’m doing just fine.” He raises his glass of champagne at you and gulps the whole thing down like he’s trying to forget. He looks angry, but not half as angry as you look when you jump up from your seat, sending your chair tumbling backwards.  
“You’re nothing like a winner, Jack,” you tell him. “And if you think you’re anywhere near to getting lucky tonight then you’ve had one too many drinks.”  
He looks at you with a face like a smacked ass, leaning back in his chair and taking a swig of his second drink. He chews on his lip in anger, but doesn’t say anything. So you take your plate and spin on your heels, walking away in search of somewhere else to eat. You get about halfway towards the grand staircase when you think _to hell with it_ and dump the plate in a trash can at the edge of the crowded room. You're not hungry anymore and you'll get bread and water for breakfast anyway.

**3:38 am**

“We can get breakfast,” Jack says as you sit on the end of the bed with your arms folded.  
As much as you’d like to storm off a leave him in the dust, he’s your only way of getting home without having to walk a hundred thousand miles from here to Sanctuary in your formal attire. So despite your anger at Jack for lulling you into his bed, you’re stuck here with him for as long as he says so.  
“I’m not hungry,” you tell him.  
“Look,” he says, sitting up in bed, the grey silk sheets coming up to his waist. You try not to look at him from the corner of your eye, but you can’t deny that it’s a tempting view. “We’re a little beyond pretending that you hate me, darlin’,” he says. “I mean, you can’t exactly say I’m your least favourite person after you let me put my -”  
You fix him with a stern look and he backs down.  
“Okay, okay. My point is, I just… alright, you know what? Keep acting like you hate me. It obviously makes you feel better about screwing me and I gotta say, I really like the way you look at me when you’re thinkin’ about cutting my balls off, so it’s a win-win, right? You can go home to your little craphole with your bandit friends and we can pretend that none of this ever happened. But it did, so that might be a little… y’know, difficult.”  
You take a deep breath, pulling your thoughts together and trying to pin a few of them down. Your mind is racing with a thousand different thoughts and feelings. But although it costs you to admit it, Jack’s right. There’s no ignoring what you did here. You get to go home, now. You got what you wanted. You just paid a higher price for it than you’d anticipated.  
And you have to admit that you don’t hate Jack like you thought you did. 

**1 hour earlier**

“I hate him,” you tell the drunk girl who’s sitting on the floor of the bathroom with you. “He’s just so… I don’t even know what he is, but I hate it.”  
“It sounds to me like you like him,” she says, punctuated by a hiccup.  
“Like him?” you scoff, “but he’s Handsome Ja - I mean, he’s an asshole. I couldn’t make myself like him if my life depended on it. He drives me crazy! He’s always laughing and joking and offering me things and telling me I look good and -”  
You cut yourself off, your heart pounding. Never has a man raised your blood pressure as much as him, yet even to you, your gripes and complaints are sounding weak and overreaching. He hasn't actually treated you that badly, all things considered.  
“You should - _hick_ \- tell him,” the drunk girl says. “Or not. Boys are tricky. You just gotta do what you feel is right.”  
You ditch your half-empty bottle of chardonnay, leaving it on the floor as you climb to your feet. “Thanks for listening,” you tell the drunk girl. “I hope you don’t… throw up on yourself or anything.”  
You slip out of the bathroom, running your hand through your hair, and carry on wandering the halls of this too-big mansion. Eventually, you end up in the doorway of a bedroom, complete with a huge four-poster bed and grey silk sheets, and wander in in search of some peace and quiet. But the room is dark and empty and it doesn’t take long for you to get bored of laying face up in the centre of the bed. You pull yourself up and decide to head out and look for Jack. you want to go back to Opportunity. You’ll take the cold hard cot in your cell over this place any day.  
You bump into Jack as you exit the room and he looks like he’s actually sobered up a little - although his top buttons are still undone and his hair is a little on the messier side of bedhead.  
“Where’ve you been?” you ask him. “You look like you’ve been in bed.”  
He smiles, hand darting up to smooth out his hair. “Nonesuch luck,” he says. “Yet.”  
You roll your eyes and step out of the way of two men who wander to the end of the corridor and turn left, leaving you and Jack alone. The chandeliers twinkle against his teeth as he grins at you. “You found the bedroom,” he says, nodding to the door behind you. “Is that an invite or just a coincidence?”  
“Do you ever stop?” you ask him, frowning.  
“Nope. Not until I've _finished,_ ” he winks.  
Your shoulders sink a little and you sigh in disbelief. “God, you are -”  
“Handsome? Talented? Charming?” he asks, taking a step towards you.  
You back away as he draws closer, the light dizziness of that half-bottle of chardonnay working its magic on your senses, teaming up with Jack to take the breath out of your lungs. “No, you’re -”  
“Irresistible? Sophisticated? Gentlemanly?” he continues, closing the distance further.  
“Well, you certainly couldn’t be accused of that,” you tell him.  
“Oh, relax,” he drawls, speaking with a smirk. “If I wasn’t such a gentleman then we’d already be in bed by now, sweetheart.”  
You shove him back, anger bubbling over and bursting. His eyes widen in surprise and for a brief moment you’re overcome with satisfaction. Then his smile returns, as wicked and scheming as ever.  
“Do you ever shut up?” you yell. “You are awful and vain and ill-mannered and you think that behaving badly makes you more interesting. Like it somehow makes up for the fact that everybody finds you insufferable. There’s a reason nobody likes you, Jack, and it’s not because they’re jealous of you. It’s because you’re always causing trouble and acting like you’re better than everyone and people don’t like it when you -”  
He rolls his eyes and steps forward and in the moment it takes him to take hold of your waist, your mind runs through so many thoughts that it simply tanks. Nothing. Nada. Does not compute. He swoops in and kisses you, pushing you against the wall of the corridor and pinning you to it hard. The kiss is rough, heated, the kind of passionate that weeks of insults and jabs and weird aggressive sexual tension culminates in. He grabs at your clothes and your limbs tingle.  
But strangely, you don’t mind.  
Your heart is racing, blood pressure through the roof, but it feels more exciting than rage-inducing. Thrilling, like you’re coming alive from the chest outward, bursting with an exhilaration that you’d never thought you’d ever feel from something as simple as a kiss. It’s like this is a satisfying culmination of all of your feelings, like the night has been building to this very moment.  
Then your brain starts up again and you push him away, raising your fingers to your lips as if his kiss was venomous.  
He stumbles back a little and watches you with a smile, the pair of you waiting to see what comes next. He smells of whiskey and vodka and champagne and pretty much every other booze that’s been invented. The music pumping through the floor from downstairs, the taste of liquor lingering on your lips. Both of you are still a little tipsy.  
And do you know what happens when Handsome Jack gets tipsy, boys and girls?  
Everything.  
Everything happens, all at once.  
The two of you collide, the open-mouthed kiss and the force of the collision vying for who can steal your breath away the quickest. Your fingers curl around the nape of his neck and his trail softly up your spine, leaving goosebumps in their wake. You shiver and he pushes you back towards the door of the bedroom with the huge four-poster bed inside.  
The two of you tumble into the quiet of the bedroom, Jack already shrugging off his suit jacket and kicking the door shut behind him. Not once do the pair of you break apart. The stillness is cut through with the sound of you both breathing heavily, the shuffling and the _gong_ of the spring mattress as you both land on it.  
With a devilish grin, he pins your wrists to the mattress on either side of your head and the next thing you know, he’s trailing kissed from your neck downwards. Down, down, down, until he reaches your stomach. It doesn’t matter that there’s no bare flesh there, it still elicits a shudder from you regardless.  
He still has hold of your wrists when he comes back up to hover over you, kneeling between your spread legs. You don’t want him to speak. You don’t want to hear the voice of a dictator coming from lips that still have your kiss drying on them. But he still speaks anyway.  
“I knew you liked me,” he smiles. Lowers himself down to press his lips to yours again.  
“I don’t like you,” you tell him between kisses. “I’m just tolerating you. I actually find you repugnant.”  
“Oh yeah?” he says, nibbling at your neck. “Tell me all about how much you hate me, sweetheart. How much I get under your skin.”  
“I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction,” you murmur, your breath skipping as his hand wanders the soft skin on the inside of your thigh.  
He chuckles against your neck, warm champagne-smelling breath brushing against the skin in a way that makes you dizzy. Your head swims with thoughts, all about Sanctuary and morals and what people would think of you back home. But, simply put; none of those things are as fun to think about as the thought of Jack pressed against you. That thought is much more interesting and it definitely holds the top place for things that are currently very important.  
You squeeze your eyes shut to rid them of the images of your friends back home and when you open them again, you find Jack pulling away. He kneels over you. Fumbles with his belt buckle.  
And you’re suddenly glad that you took this deal.

**3:29 am**

You roll onto the mattress, panting, the grey silk sheets covering you to the best of their ability.  
Everything hits you at the same time. The guilt, the tiredness, and worst of all: sobriety.  
They say people think best in the moments right after sex, when the mind is totally cleared of anything other than the important stuff. But your brain is all a jumble with things you should and shouldn’t have done. Mostly the things you shouldn’t have.  
You look across at Jack, who’s heaving heavy breaths that rack his chest. He’s grinning up at the ceiling, eyes closed in the dim light of the room. He looks about as blissful as they come and it stirs up a twinge of anger in you. This was his plan all along - you knew that - and yet you still fell for it like a besotted schoolgirl. He won, once again. Just like he always does. And the smile on his face tells you he knows it.  
“That was…” he sighs, sprawled out on the bed, still panting. “Great.”  
You swing your legs over the side of the bed, gather up your clothes from the floor. He’d torn them off so quickly that you’re surprised they’re still intact. “That should never have happened,” you tell him.  
Jack props himself up on his elbows. “Oh come on," he sighs, "don’t be such a downer.”  
You get up from the bed, pulling the sheets with you and leaving him completely exposed. With the grey silk still wrapped around you, you shuffle off to the bathroom to get changed.  
You close the door behind you.  
Look at yourself in the mirror for a while, spy the hickeys all over your chest.  
There’s no way Jack will let you leave this place without ever breathing a word of this. He’ll never let you live it down, not ever. It’ll always be something to gloat about, something to hang over your head when he wants to get under your skin. But you find yourself caring less than you thought you would. You're conflicted; not because you hate him. But because you don’t.  
Not like you did yesterday, at least.  
But the thrill of the fight is too much to resist, not when you still have so many insults under your belt to throw at him. So you tug on your clothes and head back out into the bedroom, summoning your best frown to greet him with.


End file.
